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The  Influence  of 

William  Morris 

and 

The  Kelmscott  Press 


I  As  shown  by  an  Exhibition  of  Books  from  the 

Later  English  Presses,  at  The  John  Carter 

Brown  Library  in  December,  1911 


by 


MARGARET  BINGHAM  STILLWELL 


t,      ,t    •'       »  e 


PROVIDENCE 

RHODE   ISLAND 

1912 


A,'        7 


^•^ 


Reprinted,  with  a  few  changes,  from 

the  Brown  Alumni  Monthly 

for  March,  1912 


c  c    c      c    <;      < 


Press  of  E.  A.  Johnson  &  Co. 
Providence.  R.  I. 


The  Kelmscott  Press  and 
its  Inspiration 

URING  the  winter  of  191 1,  as 
one  of  the  extension  courses  at 
Brown  University,  Mr.  H.  L. 
Koopman  of  the  John  Hay 
Library  conducted  a  class  in  "Biblio- 
graphy." Hieroglyphic  languages;  early 
alphabets;  the  manuscripts  of  Classical 
and  Mediaeval  times;  the  Invention  of 
Printing;  the  various  stages  through 
which  the  printer's  art  has  passed;  and 
the  so-called  "Revival  of  Printing"  of 
to-day,  have  each  been  touched  upon  in 
a  series  of  lectures  making  for  a  brief 
survey  of  the  history  of  book-making. 

In  connection  with  the  lectures  such 
books  illustrating  these  subjects  as  are 
in  the  John  Hay  Library  were  put  on 
exhibition  in  the  Harris  Room,  where 
the  class  met  each  week.  Early  in 
December  Mr.  William_  E.  Foster  of  the 
Providence  Public  Library  arranged  in 
the  exhibition  cases  of  that  library  books 
from  the  St.  Bride  Collection  of  Print- 


M131218 


ing  which  dealt  with  the  topic  then 
under  discussion.  Several  works  pub- 
lished in  connection  with  the  Gutenberg 
Festival  in  I9(X)  were  shown.  The  ma- 
jority of  the  books  displayed,  however, 
illustrated  the  controversy  over  the  in- 
ventor of  printing — Gutenberg  of  Mainz 
versus  Coster  of  Haarlem — which,  re- 
vived by  Germany's  Gutenberg  Celebra- 
tion in  1840,  has  raged  intermittently 
during  the  last  forty  years  or  more,  a 
controversy  which  Mr.  William  Blades, 
in  his  summary  of  the  dispute,  printed 
at  London  in  1887,  "On  the  Present 
Aspect  of  the  Question — Who  Was  the 
Inventor  of  Printing,"  aptly  terms 
"acute  warfare." 

On  December  19  the  class  visited 
the  Annmary  Brown  Memorial,  which 
is  located  not  far  from  the  University 
campus.  In  this  building,  which  was 
erected  in  1907  by  General  Rush  C. 
Hawkins  of  New  York  as  a  memorial 
to  his  wife,  there  is  a  notable  collection 
of  books  exemplifying  the  beginning  of 
printing  in  the  various  countries  of 
Europe. 

General  Hawkins*  first  fifteenth  cen- 
tury book  was  acquired  in  1855.      His 


efforts  to  find  out  something  about  the 
history  of  this  book  and  its  printer  re- 
sulted in  a  continually  growing  interest 
in  early  printing.  This  took  the  form 
of  a  resolve  "to  obtain,  if  possible,  a 
copy  of  the  first  book  issued  from  each 
of  the  first  presses,  and  failing  in  that, 
to  obtain  specimens  from  them,  even 
though  not  of  the  first  issue."  The  col- 
lection now  contains  specimens  of  the 
work  of  the  first  printers  in  every  im- 
portant European  city,  and  in  many 
of  the  lesser  towns  as  well.  These 
books  are  on  permanent  exhibition 
and  the  building,  which  also  contains 
a  collection  of  paintings  by  early 
and  later  masters,  is  open  to  the 
public  each  week  on  Tuesday,  Wednes- 
day, Thursday,  and  Friday.  Strangers 
visiting  the  city  can  usually  arrange 
to  visit  the  building  on  other  days 
by  making  application  in  advance.  Mr. 
Pollard  of  the  British  Museum,  in 
his  introduction  to  the  Catalogue  of  the 
books  in  the  Annmary  Brown  Memorial, 
says:  "This  (General  Hawkins'  main 
collection)  consists  of  some  four  hun- 
dred and  fifty  incunabula,  all  shown 
open,  so  that  the  nature  and  quality  of 


the  printing  can  be  fully  seen.  Thus  dis- 
played they  offer  to  the  visitor  as  he 
walks  around  the  four  walls  of  a  single 
room  a  better  idea  of  the  spread  of 
printing  throughout  Europe  between 
the  years  1460  and  1500  than,  to  the  best 
of  my  knowledge,  can  be  obtained  with 
equal  ease  in  any  other  museum  or  ex- 
hibition in  the  world." 

As  a  supplement  to  the  early  printed 
books  studied  by  Mr.  Koopman's  class 
at  the  Annmary  Brown  Memorial,  and 
the  books  from  the  St.  Bride  Collection 
on  view  at  the  Public  Library,  an  ex- 
hibition was  arranged  in  the  John 
Carter  Brown  Library  to  cover  still  an- 
other and  a  later  period  in  the  history 
of  printing.  This  exhibition  consisted, 
for  the  most  part,  of  specimens  of  print- 
ing from  various  English  and  American 
presses  established  during  the  last  quar- 
ter century — the  Kelmscott,  the  Vale, 
the  Essex  House  and  the  Doves  Presses 
representing  England ;  and  the  work  of 
D.  B.  Updike  and  Bruce  Rogers,  Amer- 
ica, As  none  of  these  books  come  within 
the  special  field  of  the  John  Carter  Brown 
Library,  the  exhibition  was  largely  a 
loan.     A  few  of  the  books  belonged  to 


the  late  John  Nicholas  Brown  and  are 
now  a  part  of  the  library;  others  were 
loaned  by  Mr.  Winship,  the  librarian. 
Two  books  from  the  Kelmscott  Press 
and  specimen  pages  of  the  Kelmscott 
"Chaucer"  formed  the  centre  of  interest 
in  the  exhibition.  The  first  of  these, 
"The  Life  of  Thomas  Wolsey,  Cardinal 
Archbishop  of  York,  written  by  George 
Cavendish"  and  printed  by  William 
Morris  at  the  Kelmscott  Press  in  1893, 
was  presented  by  the  editor,  Mr.  F.  S. 
Ellis,  to  Mr.  John  Nicholas  Brown;  the 
other  "A  Note  by  William  Morris  on  his 
Aims  in  Founding  the  Kelmscott  Press" 
issued  March  4,  1898,  was  the  last  book 
printed  at  the  Press,  after  the  death  of 
Mr.  Morris. 

Chronologically,  the  Kelmscott  Press 
began  the  period  frequently  spoken  of 
as  that  of  "The  Revival  of  Printing." 
Whether  or  not  this  "Revival"  would 
have  come  about  had  the  Kelmscott 
Press  never  existed,  or  had  William 
Morris  never  lived,  is  an  open  question. 
Be  that  as  it  may,  William  Morris  may 
well  be  called  the  "apostle"  of  his  time 
— an  era  of  which  John  Ruskin  was  per- 
haps the  prophet. 


William  Morris,  first  of  all,  was  a 
Mediaevalist.  For  him  the  nineteenth 
century  was  non-existent  or,  at  the  most, 
a  horrible  nightmare.  Three  centuries 
were  dropped  from  his  mental  vision. 
Blind  to  its  evils  and  discomforts,  seeing 
its  unquestioned  beauty  in  a  rosy  haze — 
Morris  would  have  us  live  the  life  of  the 
Middle  Ages.  Modern  forms  of  archi- 
tecture and  of  dress  were  an  abomina- 
tion; modern  mechanical  inventions, 
the  labor-saving  devices,  manufacturing 
plants,  were  to  him  infernal  machines. 
Modern  "so-called  civilization"  was  all 
wrong.  We  must  begin  afresh.  And  to 
do  this  we  must  hark  back  to  the 
fifteenth  century. 

In  his  "News  from  Nowhere"  Morris 
shows  us  his  ideal  world,  where  work  is 
done  with  the  hands  for  the  love  of  the 
work  itself;  where  all  workmen  are  art- 
ists, and  all  artists,  workmen;  where 
there  are  no  factories  and  no  chimneys; 
where  beautiful  buildings  are  not  "re- 
stored" and  money  is  of  no  value.  He 
sings  of  out-of-door  life,  of  picturesque 
towns,  and  kindly,  but  albeit  most  neigh- 
borly, neighbors,  and  above  all  of  joy  in 
work  and  of  joy  in  life. 


X. 


This  theory  of  Morris's  was  not  the 
passing  fancy  of  an  "Idle  Singer  of  an 
Empty  Day,"  but  a  conviction  consist- 
ently carried  ^ul  in  his  own  life.  He 
alHed  himself  with  the  cause  of  Social- 
ism in  the  hope  of  bringing  about  condi- 
tions in  which  art  could  live.  In  his  de- 
signs, whether  for  tapestries  or  wall- 
paper, stained  glass  or  furniture,  Morris 
turned  always  to  the  Mediaeval  for  his 
motive.  In  poetry  and  romance,  his 
theme  was  always  some  myth  or  tradi- 
tion coming  down  through  the  ages. 
And  so  in  printing,  he  turned  again  to 
the  past. 

As  a  book  collector,  Morris  rode  two 
hobbies — the  work  of  the  early  printers 
and  illuminated  manuscripts.  For  years 
Morris  had  collected  books  from  the 
early  presses,  his  interest  being  mainly  in 
the  woodcuts.  With  the  development  of 
his  scheme  for  starting  a  press  of  his 
own  and  the  subsequent  founding  of  the 
Kelmscott  Press  in  January,  1891, 
these  books  took  on  a  new  meaning  to 
him.  From  that  time  he  sought  to 
gather  specimens  of  beautiful  printing. 
These  he  studied,  as  he  did  his  illumin- 
ated   manuscripts,    not    that    he   might 


copy,  but  that  his  work  might  reproduce 
the  Spirit  of  the  Mediseval. 

In  his  "Note  on  his  Aims  in  founding 
the  Kelmscott  Press,"  Morris  said,  "I 
have  always  been  a  great  admirer  of  the 
caligraphy  of  the  Middle  Ages  and  of 
the  earlier  printing  which  took  its  place. 
As  to  the  fifteenth  century  books,  I  had 
noticed  that  they  were  always  beautiful 
by  force  of  the  mere  typography,  even 
without  the  added  ornament,  with  which 
many  of  them  are  so  lavishly  supplied. 
And  it  was  the  essence  of  my  undertak- 
ing to  produce  books  which  it  would  be 
a  pleasure  to  look  upon  as  pieces  of 
printing  and  arrangement  of  type.  Look- 
ing at  my  adventure  from  this  point  of 
view  then,  I  found  I  had  to  consider 
chiefly  the  following  things:  the  paper, 
the  form  of  the  type,  the  relative  spac- 
ing of  the  letters,  the  words,  and  the 
lines;  and,  lastly,  the  position  of  the 
printed  matter  on  the  page.  It  was  only 
natural  that  I,  a  decorator  by  profession, 
should  attempt  to  ornament  my  books 
suitably.  About  this  matter,  I  will  only 
say  that  I  have  always  tried  to  keep  in 
mind  the  necessity  for  making  my  deco- 
ration a  part  of  the  page  of  type." 

10 


With  characteristic  abhorrence  of  the 
machine-made,  Morris  studied  the  meth- 
ods of  paper-making  in  the  Middle  Ages. 
He  set  up  his  vats  and  with  white  linen 
rags  only,  untouched  by  chemicals,  he 
learned  to  make  the  paper  on  which  his 
Kelmscott  books,  vellum  excepted,  were 
printed.  With  the  knowledge  of  Mediae- 
val script — which  knowledge  he  held  in 
common  with  the  early  printers,  but  with 
the  advantage  that  he  also  had  at  hand 
specimens  of  the  type  which  they  them- 
selves had  produced^ — Morris  designed 
three  types:  the  ''Golden,"  the  "Troy," 
and  the  "Chaucer,"  in  which  the  influ- 
ence of  the  Roman  face  employed  by 
Jensen  and  the  Gothic  characters  of 
Schoeffer  may  be  traced.  To  the  Mediae- 
val craftsman  ornament  was  more  or 
less  incidental.  To  Morris,  the  orna- 
ment must  be  in  harmony  with  the  type ; 
it  must  form  an  integral  part  of  the 
page;  in  appearance,  the  two  pages  of 
an  open  book  must  be  so  related  as  to 
form  a  unit,  or — to  use  Morris's  own 
term — they  must  be  "architectural." 
Like  the  early  printers',  Morris's  first 
book  attained  a  full-grown  perfection. 
But  his  masterpiece  was  yet  to  be.    In 

11 


June,  1896,  only  four  months  before  he 
died,  the  magnificent  Kelmscott  "Chau- 
cer" was  completed. 

The  standard  which  the  early  print- 
ers had  to  attain  in  order  to  justify  the 
product  of  their  craft  was  of  the  very 
highest.  Although  unhampered  by  mod- 
ern commercial  conditions,  the  element 
of  competition  was  not  lacking  in  their 
work.  The  rivalry  between  the  scribes 
and  illuminators  and  the  early  printers 
resulted  in  the  monumental  products 
from  the  early  presses.  When  the  print- 
ed pages  permanently  took  the  place  of 
the  written  and  the  work  of  the  scribes 
was  over,  this  competitive  standard  was 
removed.  The  increasing  demand  for 
printed  books  led  to  the  practice  of 
economies  in  time  and  in  material,  with 
the  result  that  the  art  of  printing,  from 
that  time  on,  has  undergone  a  continu- 
ous process  of  degeneration.  Not  until 
nearly  the  end  of  the  nineteenth  century 
did  the  spirit  of  regeneration  begin  to 
manifest  itself. 

About  1890,  Mr.  Charles  Ricketts  and 
Mr.  C.  H.  Shannon  began  issuing  books 
decorated  with  wood-cut  drawings,  thus 
in  a  measure  foreshadowing  the  revival 

12 


of  the  older  ideals  of  printing.  William 
Morris,  with  keener  insight,  saw  the  im- 
possibility of  making  beautiful  books 
with  modern  appliances  and,  with 
characteristic  thoroughness,  struck  at 
the  root  of  the  matter  in  the  study 
of  paper,  type,  ink  and  "set-up." 
His  example  was  not  without  its 
effect.  In  1896,  the  first  book  in  the 
Vale  Type  designed  by  Mr.  Ricketts 
was  printed.  Like  Morris,  Mr.  Ricketts 
took  for  his  model  the  work  of  the  early 
Venetian  printers,  but  with  the  funda- 
mental difference  of  conception  that, 
whereas  Morris,  like  the  early  printers 
themselves,  approached  printing  through 
the  study  of  the  manuscript,  Mr.  Rick- 
etts "abandoned  the  old  tradition  and 
conceived  his  forms  as  cut  in  metal." 
By  1904,  the  year  in  which  the  Vale 
Press  was  brought  to  a  close,  Mr.  Rick- 
etts had  designed  three  types,  "The 
Vale,"  "The  Avon"  and  "The  King's." 
In  his  "  Bibliography  of  the  Books  is- 
sued by  Hacon  &  Ricketts,"  the  last  book 
from  their  press,  Mr.  Ricketts  writes: 
"The  novelty  of  a  book  made  during 
the  recent  revival  lies  in  the  fact  that 
it  shows  design  in  each  portion  of  it, 

13 


from  type  to  paper,  and  from  'build' 
to  decoration.  Therein  lies  the  differ- 
ence between  a  book  so  understood  and 
any  other  modern  book  printed  before 
1891 ;  therein  lies  their  affinity  with  the 
grand  volumes  of  the  Italian  and  Ger- 
man presses.  A  Kelmscott  book,  and, 
if  I  may  say  so,  a  Vale  book,  is  a  living 
and  corporate  whole,  the  quality  of 
beauty  therein  is  all-pervading;  it  is  not 
decorated  as  a  modern  house  is  deco- 
rated by  the  upholsterer  and  the  picture 
dealer;  it  is  conceived  harmoniously  and 
made  beautifully  like  any  other  genuine 
work  of  art.  Unity,  harmony,  such  are 
the  essentials  of  fine  book  building." 

The  Guild  of  Handicraft  at  Hammer- 
smith, London,  fearing  that  any  attempt 
to  establish  another  press  would  seem 
almost  "an  impertinence,"  did  not  take 
up  the  craft  of  printing  while  the  Kelms- 
cott Press  was  in  existence.  With 
Morris's  death,  the  situation  changed. 
Mr.  C.  R.  Ashbee  of  Essex  House,  the 
headquarters  of  the  Guild,  immediately 
opened  negotiations  with  the  trustees  of 
Morris's  estate  and  succeeded  in  pur- 
chasing all  the  plant  with  the  exception 
of  the  type  and  blocks — these  being  de- 

14 


posited  by  the  trustees  in  the  British 
Museum.  He  also  was  fortunate  in  se- 
curing the  services  of  various  men  who 
had  worked  with  Morris  at  the  Kelms- 
cott  Press  and  who  brought  with  them 
to  the  newly  established  Essex  House 
Press  some  of  the  tradition  and  ideals 
which  Morris  had  tried  to  instil  into 
them.  A  little  later,  Mr.  T.  J.  Cob- 
den-Sanderson,  sometime  binder  of 
Kelmscott  books,  associated  with  one 
of  Morris's  most  intimate  friends,  Mr. 
Emery  Walker,  in  1900  founded  the 
Doves  Press  "to  attack  the  problem  of 
pure  Typography,  as  presented  by  ordi- 
nary books  in  the  various  forms  of 
prose,  verse  and  dialogue,  and  keeping 
always  in  view  the  principle  laid  down 
in  the  Book  Beautiful,  that  *The  whole 
duty  of  Typography  is  to  communicate 
to  the  imagination,  without  loss  by  the 
way,  the  thought  or  image  intended  to 
be  conveyed  by  the  author.' " 

In  America,  Morris  has  had  a  host  of 
followers.  Two,  Daniel  Berkeley  Up- 
dike of  the  Merrymount  Press  and 
Bruce  Rogers  at  the  Riverside,  caught 
the  inspiration  without  losing  its  mean- 
ing through  striving  to  imitate  peculiari- 

15 


ties.  Each  has  won  a  reputation  which 
is  based  upon  work  done  quite  as  well  as 
anything  produced  on  the  other  side  of 
the  Atlantic. 

Thus  the  seed  sown  by  William 
Morris  developed — not  by  imitation  of 
Kelmscott  books,  but  by  an  attempt  on 
the  part  of  each  of  these  presses  to  re- 
produce the  spirit  of  the  master  printers 
of  the  Middle  Ages.  In  1894,  in  an  ad- 
dress on  Art  and  Labor,  Morris  said, 
"The  new  birth  of  art  will  be  brought 
about  noiselessly,  gradually  and  without 
violent  change."  Ten  years  later,  Mr. 
Ricketts  in  summing  up  the  regeneration 
of  the  craft  of  printing,  wrote,  "It  isl 
now  almost  unnecessary  to  say  that  thej 
finer  conditions  of  book  building  wen 
realized  for  the  first  time  in  moderi 
printing  by  William  Morris  in  th( 
Kelmscott  Press." 


16 


CO 

CN 
CN 


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